Reevaluation and Realization
by QueenoftheLab96
Summary: Booth and Bones talk after they come back. BB. Oneshot. Please read and review.


"Booth, I Love you"

Those four words, coming out of his partner's lips were enough to make him doubt his sanity. For a second he thought he was having that dream again. He could feel his heart accelerate, sending blood everywhere except where he needed it, his brain. He looked at her with a look that suggested he had been hit over the head with a cooper pan. "I know, Bones. I've known it all along." She looked at him questioningly. "Call it a gut-feeling." He said hastily.

"Then, Sergeant Major Booth, I must admit your gut is very accurate." She added teasingly.

"So I've been told, Dr. Brennan." He replied humorously. Booth took a step closer to her. "I love you, Bones. Always have, and Always will." He whispered in her ear. He took a step back, and looked at her, a smile etched on her lips. Her skin was a few shades darker, because of her work out doors. Her hair was shorter, and she was just a little bit thinner. She had dark circles under her eyes, because of lack of sleep.

"I missed you Booth, I realized I never want to be away from you for such an extended period of time." She admitted quietly. She had been so surprised when she'd seen him by the coffee cart waiting for her. She had been thinking about what she'd say to him when she saw him, but when she actually did see him, all of her ideas left her.

"Bones, I've been giving this a lot of thought. That night, when we went to talk to Sweets about his book, and he told me to take a chance, you rejected me." He looked at her in order to make sure she was following. "I asked you to give us a shot. You said you were trying to protect me from you. I told you I would never abandon you, or hurt you. You still rejected me. I told you I would have to move on."

"Booth, I have hated myself for that since then, I have hated myself for hurting you, and for saying no to the one thing I have dreamed, and fantasized about since we met." She said, hurt.

"So have I, Temperance. I hate myself for not fighting for us. I hate myself for giving up hope." He said forcefully, trying to get her to understand. "I now know we were not as ready as Sweets thought. You ran I did nothing to stop you, I ran and you didn't try to stop me. I tried moving on, and found Catherine. You did the same, with Hacker. We each saw it didn't work, because we knew that all we wanted, all that we needed, we could find in each other."

"What are you saying?" she asked confused.

"What I'm saying, Bones is that we tried to move on, forget of each other. We were both looking for each other in the people we thought most resembled the other. To me Catherine was like a very bad copy of you. Like a pirated movie. She was beautiful, and smart, but she just wasn't you. Looking back now, I see the only reason I continued seeing her until I left was because I could sense a tinge of jealousy in you when we talked about her." He flashed his Cocky grin. "And I figured that maybe making you jealous might work. It seems like something a love-sick teenager would do."

"Yes, it does, but it doesn't matter now, does it? You are the one that always told me to forget about the past and move on. Maybe we should forget about what happened before we left. I think we…"she was silenced mid-sentence by her partner's lips. They were pressing against hers very much as they had done that night in front of the J. Edgar Hoover building a little over a year ago.

He kissed her slowly, and waited for her to respond, which she did greedily. They stood there, his hands on her back pulling her close, hers resting on his broad shoulders.

They pulled away after what seemed like an eternity.

"Bones, this time I'm not giving up all that easily." He looked at her to make sure she understood. "Will you, Temperance Brennan, Bones, be willing to give us a shot? Will you let me show you what loving really is like?"

"Yes, yes, yes, yes, a million times yes, Booth. I'm not going to make the same mistake as before. I'm not going to let you go."

Booth looked at her as though she had made him the happiest man on earth, and indeed she had. He snaked his arms around her waist and lifted her up. He spun her around, and kissed her softly on the lips before setting her down again. To her the smile on his face was priceless.


End file.
